181–190 of 195 posts
A funny looking district != a gerrymandered district. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/gerrymandering-strange-maps_n... I mean, just imagine if every district were a simple polygon. How could that possibly work with population density variations, minority voter distribution, physical barriers like mountains and rivers, etc?
While humorous, a high percentage of these districts look this way due to rivers and lakes.
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Interesting how everything is only Democrats vs Republicans in the USA. It probably does not help the political climate that for most people it is just a binary choice.
That's a consequence of first-past-the-post voting (Duverger's law), not gerrymandering.
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>One of the arguments in favor of the electoral college is that it boosts the voice of people who are in areas with lower population density Why should people get more say because they live more spread out? Why do 100k people living across the countryside get more say than 100k people living in a city? If 5 million people live in a city and 2 million people live in the countryside, the people in the city should have…
The real answer is because we’re a union of states, many of which would not have joined under that representation scheme. You need to amend the constitution to change that. It’s hard to do, but again that was intentional.
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So instead of making a choice between 2-5 candidates (major 2 plus a few independents/smaller parties), every voter has to rank up to 50 candidates (assuming ranked choice voting)? How do you expect voters to know the policy positions of that many candidates? They may as well be picking at random. If not ranked choice voting, how would this even work?
If you're going to have a large multi-member district with proportional representation, it's not essential to use ranked-choice voting - you can get a reasonable result just by having people vote once for the ticket of candidates they prefer, then allocating the seats proportionally. That said, ranked-choice voting in large multi-member districts is certainly possible: It is usual to require voters to rank only as ma…
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It seems that across countries the size of the parlament is proportional to the square root of the population size: https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/364/is-there-an...
Interesting. I am not sure what the underlying basis of the cube root is, but the population of the U.S. has gone from 80 million to 340 million since 1911 and the size of the assembly has not changed in that period. I think it is an overlooked aspect that could be at the root of a many problems. Also , no states have been added in over 60years , it is time D.C. And Puerto Rico get state hood.
I'd rather dissolve D.C. and re-institute the original state boundaries of Maryland and Virginia than elevate a district to a state.
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yours would best be described as the 'naive' take on the situation, and rests on a false premise. These minorities need 'help' in that a majority is going to be self-interested and lacking compassion or any sort of integrity at larger scope. In the U.S. this might take the form of tax loopholes for speedboats and golf memberships eating into funding for basic social services (infrastructure, law enforcement, educatio…
There will always be a majority and there will always be a minority. But the thought process behind, "they are a minority, therefore they need assistance" is elitism at best and racism at worst. Furthermore, the laws that we pass that give special treatment to one group over another make that divide all the more permanent.
I think most decent minded folks can see where this is leading.
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The real answer is because we’re a union of states, many of which would not have joined under that representation scheme. You need to amend the constitution to change that. It’s hard to do, but again that was intentional.
America was originally a union of colonies separated by economic focuses and communication difficulties - those concerns are no longer relevant in the modern world and sticking to a tradition because "that's what it's always been" isn't a good general policy.
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There will always be a majority and there will always be a minority. But the thought process behind, "they are a minority, therefore they need assistance" is elitism at best and racism at worst. Furthermore, the laws that we pass that give special treatment to one group over another make that divide all the more permanent.
* The laws we are talking about are to mitigate abuse and oppression by a majority. * You seem especially vitriolic in defending the status quo. * The status quo is full of examples wherein a minority group is unfairly impacted. * You are even willing to make the claim that these protections are themselves racist and should not be attempted under any circumstances. I think most decent minded folks can see where this…
I'm vitriolic towards any law that gives one group preferential treatment under the law. The entire premise of American democracy is majority rule within limits. The founding fathers already gave us ways to protect the minority's rights via the judicial system and the constitution. You cannot legislate status quo because it is derived from the sentiment of the population. If you want to change the sentiment you need to halt the division. You cannot pass a bill forcing black to love white, you can only pass bills that make the distinction irrelevant.
> I think most decent-minded folks can see where this is leading.
Hopefully to a world where people are judged by the content of their character and not by some physical attribute or thing they identify as.
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* The laws we are talking about are to mitigate abuse and oppression by a majority. * You seem especially vitriolic in defending the status quo. * The status quo is full of examples wherein a minority group is unfairly impacted. * You are even willing to make the claim that these protections are themselves racist and should not be attempted under any circumstances. I think most decent minded folks can see where this…
> You seem especially vitriolic in defending the status quo. I'm vitriolic towards any law that gives one group preferential treatment under the law. The entire premise of American democracy is majority rule within limits. The founding fathers already gave us ways to protect the minority's rights via the judicial system and the constitution. You cannot legislate status quo because it is derived from the sentiment of…
Juust so you are aware, this all extends far beyond questions of race, not sure why you are so focused on that, but it's probably pretty telling.
Also, I'm not at all sure what you see as a distinction between these protections and "founding fathers already gave us ways to protect the minority's rights via the judicial system...".
We are discussing implementation of that Founding Father Judicial system stuff in this thread, please expand on why you think it serves as an argument against modfying or creating laws to protect abused classes?